With the end of the year fast approaching it is that time again to revive this popular Wetpixel tradition. Click to see the 2005, 2006, 2007 and 2008 editions.

The rules are pretty simple. Please post your favourite (not necessarily your best) underwater photo taken during 2009. And you can only post one image (although I should add that rule breaking has become something of a tradition too!).

Feel free to post why you like it and the kit you used, but it is not essential. And hopefully even Mike V will have something this year!

This is far from my best image from 2009, but it goes down as my most memorable - because it took a few months, three dives to create and considerable help from my dive buddy Adam Hanlon! The difficulty makes it a favourite.

The main problem was getting the remote strobes to fire reliably, when hidden from view of the on camera strobes. I chose to use a Heinrichs RSU - which is a neat solution for these types of shots, but first I learned it is not compatible with my Subtronic strobes, and then I found that it is incredibly sensitive to ambient light (even the ambient light levels at the bottom of an English quarry are too much). So after suitable modifications (using a YS30 as a trigger strobe and building a shade for the RSU) I was finally able to create the image I wanted of a ghostly beetle, lit from the inside, but not outside. The off camera strobes were also a great way to get around the poor viz on that day.

Although this image was very difficult to take The good thing about going through a process like that - is that I could repeat the image now in a couple of minutes, having got the kit working reliably and understood how the technique works.

ok here is mine.. nothing so technical such as Alex's but just a fun shot instead. We were messing around on the surface interval in Bunaken taking some over/unders as the crew was having fun jumping in the water. I got them to count to three and jump at me while i shot.. Got it in one take

Shame about the ladder in the background though... and the damn Italian on the left who can't keep his head down!

Mine is a simple shot from a very remote place, Fakahina, French Polynesia. I think no one ever dived here ever, and I only freedived, so still.I was here for a field part of a study on the blacktip reef shark. Here is a juvenile I captured, and took a few shot with my hand on before release.It have nothing particular exept the hand size compared to the shark (who was 54cm TL), but of it is special to me...

400D, Tokina 10-17: 10. 1/500, F/10. No strobe. damn sun, it still hurt when I think about it.

It's all started with the late evening visit (the exact reason is still unknown) to Mike and Simon office in May ;-)And was materialized half a globe away in November (was it an obsessive idea?).It is clownfish eggs. And I can bet I have seen heart beat one or two times per second (or it is the rare case of shallow water nitrogen narcosis)

It is always a challenge to pick a yearly favorite photo! I have picked a favorite shot from my favorite or at least most memorable day of shooting salmonids in 2009. I managed to do a list of firsts on this day.

Here we have a Dolly Varden pair just commencing to spawn. The female is squatting in her just-excavated redd. The male is still doing his courtship display but was in moments beside the female. The next shot I took has him gaping next to the female in a similar posture to her. I like this shot because it shows more of both fish compared to actual spawning.

Not my best shot, but certainly my most memorable. My first view of Scar barreling down on me like a nuclear submarine. I knew about Scar, but had no idea what he looked like or if this was him at the point this picture was taken. I was separated from the group, essentially by myself. I had no idea of his intentions -friend or foe? Two seconds later he had barreled into me and was rolling around under me, opening his mouth, certainly getting all my intention.2009 was a great diving year - Manatees and Blue Heron, Cuba Silkies, Bahamas Whitetips, Cocos - Alcyone, and then of course the Sperm Whale experience. Also lots of pool work. 2010 is shaping up as well. To hell with the economy and airport security, Carpe Diem!

It seems I'm going to be the first to break the "only one photo" rule. Sorry Alex. I tried to only pick one, but I have two favs for two very different reasons.

The first is of a hind that was hunting damselfish. We were diving on the house reef (Calabas) very near the end of our three week trip to Bonaire and had been captivated by all the animal behaviour we were seeing. I was watching this hind slink over and around the corals and rocks trying to sneak up on a damsel. I immediately thought it would make a good subject, if I could get the behaviour and if I could get a good background. Well, the hind slinked over the coral in the photo and paused as it looked at a damsel just out of the frame. That was the moment I caught. Very cool fish. I used a Canon 30D in an Ikelite housing, a 100/2.8 macro and a single DS-160.. and a little patience.

The other image, I shot yesterday at Whytecliff Marine Park, West Vancouver, BC (its about a 45-50 minute drive from my house). At the end of the dive, on one of those very rare sunny winter days here, I looked up at the surface. The vis and the sun were in agreement - finally! The image for me says something about why I dive, why I try to shoot and dive. I used the 30D, with a Sigma 15 fish and had a single DS-160 mounted, but turned off.

Sorry about breaking the one photo rule - I know I don't have any clout around here to be doing that.